


Till Death Do Us Join

by brethilaki



Category: Supernatural
Genre: First Kiss, First Time, Heaven, Metaphysical Coupling, Other, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Sexual Content, Soul Bond, Wings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-19
Updated: 2013-03-19
Packaged: 2017-12-05 18:42:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,486
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/726591
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brethilaki/pseuds/brethilaki
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean's death brings him closer to Cas.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Till Death Do Us Join

**Author's Note:**

> I feel obliged to warn you that this is a little weird.
> 
> A few other characters come into the story, but I didn't tag them because they don't really do anything.

Dean felt warm blood running down his chest and welling up in his mouth. Oh. Well, this was nothing new. He'd had worse. Actually, he felt pretty good, considering. He heard Sammy scream his name, but it was distant. He blacked out.

Dean woke up in a strip club, which in itself wasn't all that strange. Sammy didn't seem to be there; in fact the club appeared empty apart from the strippers. The strangest thing was the sense of peace he felt, like being drunk, but without the muddying of his mind. It was alien to him, but deeply familiar. He understood.

“I'm in Heaven, aren't I?” he spoke aloud to himself. “This is my pie in the sky. I guess there are worse places I could be spending the rest of eternity. Alone.” He glanced up at the dancers, “No offense, ladies,” and wondered with a sad smile whether he could get a drink—or maybe some actual pie—and how being drunk would feel, if this was sober.

“You are never alone,” said a voice from behind him, and he spun around to see Cas looking around with mild interest before meeting his eyes. “Hello, Dean.”

“Cas...” Dean choked, overcome with a sudden rush of bittersweet memories of life. His vision blurred, his head sank to the angel's shoulder, and he wept while Cas held him silently, resting his chin on the top of Dean's head.

 

It was a long moment before he recovered, or at least remembered to be embarrassed about his feelings, a shame which his time in Heaven would slowly melt away. Cas looked forward to watching it fade. For the moment he was respectful of Dean's lingering pride, ignoring the trembling of his voice as he asked after Sam. Cas promised to watch over the surviving brother.

But Sam (predictably) fell out of hunting. His life was no longer in constant danger, and though Cas still watched him, he found he preferred to watch Dean's face as he listened to the stories of Sam's life, his marriage, his first child.

When Cas was gone—checking on Sam or attending to some celestial business—Dean watched the strippers with vaguely familiar faces (the specters past sexual conquests, no doubt) and continued an ongoing experiment to discover if it were possible to get drunk in Heaven. He didn't often have to wait long for the angel's return, and never long enough for him to feel the absence, as time passed differently in Heaven than it did on earth. When Dean was content, the time between visits lengthened into languid hours (weeks, ages), and when he was lonely or bored it flew.

During one of these leaves of absence, a visitor appeared who wasn't Cas.

“Ash!” Dean said in surprise. It had been a very long time since he had seen that face.

“Sorry I didn't find you sooner,” Ash greeted him with a clap on the shoulder. “Wasn't sure how long you'd be here.” Dean nodded in understanding and grinned crookedly, assuring Ash that (as far as he knew) this time he was there to stay.

“Well, now that I've found you, how about you share a drink with a few old friends.” Dean had been downing shots of whiskey, one after another, since Cas left last, and he wasn't even buzzed.

“I never was one to refuse a drink,” Dean accepted, smiling wider and swallowing a short burst of emotion that threatened to surface in anticipation of the reunion—which proved quite as jarring as he expected. There was Ellen, and Jo—whom he hugged tensely—, Pam here, and over there Bobby—who hugged him fiercely—and finally

“Mom...” Dean's breath caught, only slightly, and he didn't let go of his mother and open his eyes until he was sure no tears would come. This was a happy place. This was no place for tears. If something was bothering him—an absence, a question he shouldn't have and a hope that seemed to rely only on his ignorance to the truth—he would leave it unspoken for the duration of his long visit, ignore it until he was alone again.

 

But it was lonely alone with his own dark thoughts, and before he had brooded long, a light appeared unbidden.

“Is my dad still in Hell?”

Dean knew he was being cruel and unfair. He knew he had no business being angry at anyone else for something that was his father's own stupid fault. And he didn't know why, more than all the friends he'd just left, he felt more comfortable (or less guilty) laying his troubles on Cas.

“Dean...” Cas said slowly, gently, “he sold his soul.”

“ _I_ sold my soul!” Dean snapped, knowing full well he was projecting his own guilt on his friend, and feeling the more guilty for it, “and here I am!”

“That was different. You,” Cas countered, even more softly, fixing Dean with a stern look, “are different.”

“No, Cas. Or, fine, yes, maybe I am, but I _know_ what it's like down there. How can I... how can _you expect me to_ just sit on my ass in Heaven while he's...” Dean trailed off, knowing he wasn't being fair. Cas sighed.

“What do you want me to do, Dean? We cannot... I _personally_ cannot rescue every deserving soul that has been sold to Hell!”

“So why me.”

“I thought you were over this, Dean. You _know_ why.”

“Yeah. Because you were following orders.” Cas looked miffed but Dean went on. Words welled up that had long lain locked just below the surface of his skin. Now that that mortal coil was shed, his soul was exposed and weak, and the hole left in his heart by John's torment (and Dean's own guilt therefrom) let these words trickle out. “I didn't deserve that more than... more than anyone else.”

“What should I do, then? Throw you back?” Cas snapped, then his face fell. “Dean, I didn't mean that...”

“No, you're right,” Dean finally admitted. “Just... survivor guilt, I guess... I...” Cas waited, but Dean trailed off. He had already said more than he was comfortable with.

“I understand,” Cas replied after a pause. “Now listen to me.” He paused again to consider his words. “Dean, you are dead. Your work is over. Maybe I saved you acting on orders, but now that I know I have a choice, I also know I would do the same thing again. You can't measure your value by weighing your successes against your failures. You have to believe you have some inherent worth. Maybe it isn't any more than—maybe you aren't any worthier than your father or other innocents—” (Dean scoffed at the term) “—who found their way into Hell, but you are certainly no less worthy, and you are worth more _to me_!”

For all his talk about “inherent” value, it was Cas's final, selfish statement that struck Dean most, because he had always measured his value by the worth he held to those worth most to him: a father he strove to please, a brother he swore to protect. He realized this now, and he realized it was probably not fair; but the greatest realization was the implication that Cas belonged to that group, and that Dean was worth as much to Cas as Cas was to him.

Cas was watching him process these revelations, and seemed to be glowing faintly. Had he always glowed like that? Just in Heaven? Or was this the first time? Dean couldn't remember. At the same time, the idea of him and Cas validating each other's existence through their strange symbiosis of mutual admiration was lighting a similar glow that radiated warmly from Dean's own core, a feeling uncomfortably familiar but foreign enough to be disorienting.

Dean swallowed nervously. Usually this sort of sensation would be accompanied by a boner—and that was the time it took Dean's mind to shift tracks from filial guilt to sex. Dean pushed the idea back in mild alarm and tried to reboard his previous train of thought: his dad was stuck in Hell, and there was nothing that could be done about that—nothing Cas was willing to do, anyway. Maybe he should talk to Bobby? Or, maybe, if he kept pestering Cas, he could get him to... do _something_ anyway; I mean, was it even possible to get a boner in Heaven? Dean had been watching a pretty nonstop striptease since he arrived, and he hadn't popped one yet, though it isn't like he'd _tried_... wait, when did he get back to boners?

“It is possible,” Cas offered, as Dean rubbed his temples.

“Huh?”

“It is possible to achieve arousal in Heaven, but only as a function of intimate contact between two entities. Two graces, two souls... a grace and a soul...” Cas looked down, uncharacteristically bashful.

“I... uh...” Dean floundered. “Wait, were you reading my mind?” he demanded, meaning to sound angry but not quite managing. “That's not cool, man!” he added for good measure.

“I'm... sorry, it's hard to resist; without the barrier of a body, your soul is... very bright, and your feelings very palpable and difficult to ignore...” Cas tugged nervously at the knot of his tie. He looked up and moved forward a halting half step. Dean blinked and squinted—yeah, Cas was definitely glowing. He was warm, too, and somehow magnetic... Dean leaned forward, and Cas, taking this as a cue, closed the gap between them with a small kiss that sparked immediately, setting a fire that traced Dean's warm feelings back to their origin in the core of his soul. Briefly his being was in turmoil, but settled into an enveloping sense of wonder, a primordial feeling of peace. Cas broke the kiss and Dean went limp in his arms, overwhelmed.

“Cas, what—what is this?” he asked dizzily, eyes fluttering shut to let the emotions wash through his naked soul like cold seawater.

“You could call it spiritual arousal,” Cas held Dean gently, stroked him with his fingers and the tips of his wings (had he always had wings?), and had Dean had a body left to leave the experience might have been ecstatic. “It marks the intimate communion between to essences. I felt a similar thing when I plucked you from Perdition.”

“Perve,” Dean accused, making no effort to actually sound accusatory. Cas frowned.

“It's not that same thing as physical arousal, Dean,” he explained. “In smaller increments it is the awe felt by the deeply religious in the contemplation of God, or even the non-religious when faced with the beauty of Creation. So to an intermediary extent, yes, that is what I felt when I experienced directly the raw glory of His greatest Work—no, Dean, not you, personally (not yet), but the human soul, though yours imprinted itself upon me specially. I—”

and here Cas paused for a long time looking hard at Dean, glorious but vulnerable, as if the one thing he wanted most to know was the only thing hidden from his piercing gaze. Finally he took a deep breath and plunged headfirst into

“I have loved you, Dean, since the first moment my grace clutched your soul, and I have known it since I was human enough to distinguish the Love of all other creation... from the love of you.” He had been looking at the floor as he spoke, but when he finished he looked abruptly up at Dean, then off to the side with a frustrated sigh (the way he was wont to do when uneasy) and deposited Dean's still overcome soul on the seat of a booth, taking a step back while avoiding his eyes. “I'm sorry, Dean,” he said quickly, clearly distressed. “I never meant to tell you any of that, I just—”

“Why?” Dean spoke with effort, but the importance of the words that needed to be said broke through his daze.

“I'm sorry, Dean,” Cas repeated, wringing his hands, but Dean surged forward and stilled them with one of his own, using the other to cup Cas's chin gently but desperately firm, forcing him to face Dean's searching eyes.

“Why—” Dean choked. “Why would you keep this from me? Cas...”

Cas looked at the floor, looked up at his name, looked down again.

“Dean, I'm sorry,” Cas said for the third time, “I... didn't think you would reciprocate.”

“Yeah, well, neither did I...” Dean mumbled half to himself as he reined Cas in the step he had receded, and a half step more until he was standing between Dean's legs, then pulled his head down roughly for a kiss that was hotter and fiercer and wetter than the last, hands grasping at everything his fingers could close around, Cas chanting between little breaks, “Sorry, Dean, sorry, didn't know, sorry, Dean, I'm sorry,” until Dean panted, “Cas. 'S okay. Just touch me. Touch me now.”

So Cas's hands ran over every facet and fissure of Dean's soul (melting the illusion of clothes where he touched), Dean's fiery soul, hot as the day he was saved but not with hellfire or holy fire or sunfire or any fire that had burnt Cas in his long journey to the moment fire awakened inside him, dancing against his skin shamelessly as the strippers forgotten on the stage, overshadowing all sensation (all memory of sensation) but the heat of Dean's soul touching him back.

“God... oh, God...” Dean groaned, moving against Cas's grace. Cas smiled fondly and fluttered his wings.

“Not quite, Dean.” He fitted his hand perfectly over the palm print that had seared through Dean's flesh and branded his soul, grasping it tightly and pulling Dean toward him as he breathed hot into Dean's ear— _but He has blessed me this day—_ and let his wings fold around them like an opaque black veil. The darkness only made Cas's glow brighter, blinding as snow in the sun. Dean could see it even through his lidded eyes. He felt like his feet had left the ground, and the air crackled (his nerves sparked) like lightning and smelled like rain. He felt clean—cleansed—and there was water on his face but it was not rain. When he opened his eyes it was like looking at the sun for the first time after forty years of blindness broken only by burning brimstone.

“What... what are you doing to me?” he gasped in choking awe looking up to see the face of an angel bearing the face of a friend—had Cas always been taller than him? No, of that much he was sure.

“I know your soul better than anyone, Dean. I knew your body better still—better than you—it was beautiful, if I can say that without pride.”

“I wish you'd have gotten around to this before I lost it,” he lamented, though only halfheartedly, for he was too content to feel very sorry about anything.

“No,” Cas assured him, “this will be better.” Dean was about to ask what he was supposed to do (or at least what exactly _this_ was), but suddenly he felt something growing inside him, something that was more substantial than the warm feeling it displaced and that at once filled and enveloped him. He gasped in pleasure and slight discomfiture, and slowly it receded.

“Cas?” he asked, apprehensive, “what was that?” It gave him some comfort to hear that, when Cas responded, he was as winded as Dean felt.

“My grace... surrounding your soul,” he breathed.

“Surrounding? On the inside?”

“My grace... exists on a higher plane than your soul, and can grasp it from the inside as well as out. When I raised you from Hell, I surrounded it almost completely—but you were unconscious, then, and damaged. I hoped... I would like to hold you like that again, in Heaven here where your soul is awake and intact enough to perceive it. I wanted to meld with you, to... briefly... become one. If you consent.” He brushed Dean's scar again and something in the back of Dean's mind stirred with the half-remembered sensation of a pleasure whose further qualities flitted tantalizingly at the edge of his cognition and which he was suddenly overcome with the desire to discern.

“Yes, Cas, yes. Hell yes.” Aware that he was moaning the words, Dean let go the last pretense of pride and groaned, “Please,” finally demolishing the leaking dam stopping the channel that connected his heart to his eyes. Cas kissed his forehead, kissed his tears, kissed each of his freckles one by one as the warmth of his grace pulsed in and around Dean again, filling him a little fuller and holding him a little tighter each time, until he was whole and wholly enclosed. But it didn't stop: filling spaces inside him and enveloping sides and facets of his soul he didn't know or remember he had, things locked away and pushed aside.

“Cas...” he whined.

“Dean,” Cas answered him soothingly, voice washing over him like a balm. Dean was weeping violently now, feeling filled and loved and distinctly unworthy.

“So good... Cas...” he writhed and Cas stilled him with strong soft wings. “It's too good!”

“Nothing is too good for you.” Cas's voice was so full of love it broke through the calm and stung where it soothed. “How can I show you that? Dean...”

“Let me...” Dean was grinding into Cas, trying to imitate the motions of sex, which was his only analogue to a metaphysical coupling he could not wholly comprehend. He cried out and Cas let a small whimper mingle with the shout. “God, Cas, at least tell me what to do... in return...” he pleaded, concentrating intensely to get the words out.

“You've already done everything for me...Dean...” Cas's voice, too, was beginning to sound strained. “You taught me to feel... I am... returning the favor.” He leaned in and kissed Dean hard as his grace pulsed a final time and stopped, quivering slightly—and at that moment there was not a single particle of Dean's being that was not in contact with Castiel. He writhed, and this time Cas writhed with him. He groaned into the kiss, and the groan echoed back in Cas's voice. Stars exploded across his vision, and he whited out.

 

Dean came to, trembling and sweating, feeling naked and hollow, and also like he'd just had the best orgasm of his life. Afterlife.

“The fuck...” he muttered, grabbing his reeling head and looking around at the dark strip club that had seemed so distant only moments before.

“Dean.” Cas was standing in front of him and touched his shoulder. There was a spark in the touch.

“Did...” Dean looked up uncertainly. “Did we just fuck?” Cas blushed.

“I... um... I suppose that is a good analogy, yes,” he mumbled. “We... were united. Before God.”

“You make it sound like we just tied the knot.”

“I don't understand.”

“Married, Cas. That's what people say when they get married.”

“I see. The knot refers to the bond of matrimony, and the tying to the ceremony?”

“Uh, yeah.”

“Angels do not have expressions like that. We don't marry. We form bonds of companionship, and of subordination to our superiors.”

“That's kind of kinky,” Dean said, but Cas ignored him.

“We do share a different kind of bond, Dean, but I would like to believe it is stronger than a knot or a marriage.”

“Like superglue?” And because it was clear that Dean still was not comfortable with this degree of sincerity outside the throes of sex, Cas was silent, and waited for Dean to bring up the one serious thing important enough to him to overcome that discomfort.

“I— you know I'm not going to give— you know I still can't give up, Cas,” he said at length. “On my dad. It's... it's family.”

“I can't lose you.”

“You won't. I'm just going to ask around.” Cas looked unsatisfied.

“Asking doesn't worry me, Dean, but what will happen when you find something?” Dean was unprepared to make any promises, but Cas gave his terms:  
“It's useless to tell you not to do anything dangerous. So tell me before you do. Dean, I would rather be locked in Hell with you than free in Heaven alone. We are bound.” As uncomfortable as it still made Dean, he knew it was true.

“If I promise, can we seal it with a kiss?”

Cas smiled faintly; he didn't answer but pulled Dean in and kissed him long and slow and sweet. And every unsaid thing, every word held patiently by a guarded tongue slipped between them silently.

 

_Symbiosis._

Was the word Cas wouldn't say when “superglue” lightened his moment.

 _Interdependent. Like lichen_ , was the metaphor he preferred to “tying the knot.”

 

_If death could only bring us closer—what could keep us apart?_


End file.
